


The Best Fish

by agerefandom (tazia101)



Category: Rooster Teeth/Achievement Hunter RPF
Genre: Alcohol, Established Relationship, Fluff, M/M, Non-Sexual Age Play, We Need To Get Better Agere Tags On Here, agere
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-01-15
Updated: 2020-01-15
Packaged: 2021-02-27 06:41:41
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,328
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/22262776
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/tazia101/pseuds/agerefandom
Summary: Gavin and Ryan have been together for years. Late at night, after five months of living together, Gavin finally confessed that he age regresses, and Ryan didn't react well. A few days later, Ryan has a surprise for his partner.
Relationships: Gavin Free/Ryan Haywood
Comments: 1
Kudos: 80





	The Best Fish

**Author's Note:**

> Originally posted on my tumblr, @agerefandom. I take requests from sfw blogs for age regression fics! 
> 
> AO3 has bad tags for age regression stuff: the non-sexual kink tags are as close as I can get. I hope I can help to get the 'agere' tag off the ground eventually. Anyways, hope you enjoy!

Gavin was sitting in bed, absorbed in a YouTube spiral, when he heard a knock at the bedroom door.

“Come in!” Gavin called, hitting pause on his video. When he looked up, Ryan had opened the door and was leaning against the doorway awkwardly, hands behind his back. “’ello, love, what do you need?” Gavin asked. Ryan’s hesitation was odd: it was their shared bedroom after all, they had been living together for almost six months.

“I wanted to say sorry,” Ryan said.

“You wanted to what?” Gavin closed his laptop, giving his boyfriend his full attention.

“I wanted to say sorry,” Ryan repeated, sounding more certain of himself this time. “About a couple days ago.”

“A… few days ago.” Gavin could feel his face dropping into a frown: he was almost certain he knew what Ryan was referring to.

It had been late at night, and they had started out watching a movie, but the credits had been long finished and they had stayed on the couch, Gavin’s head in Ryan’s lap and Ryan’s fingers combing through his hair.

They had been talking about their childhoods, for some reason or another, and Gavin had asked Ryan if he ever wished he could go back to that kind of careless existence, being a kid again, and Ryan had said he did.

And then Gavin had thought that maybe Ryan would understand, as he stumbled through an explanation that sometimes he liked to do that, liked to roll himself in blankets and watch kid’s movies that he would normally scoff at, liked to pretend that he was a kid and he didn’t have to think about the million things that jostled for his attention from day to day.

Ryan had asked a few questions and then stopped talking entirely, which was never a good sign. Gavin had kept talking because he was bad at shutting up, and Ryan’s expression had grown more and more neutral, and eventually Gavin had given up and stumbled to bed, dumping the rest of his beer into the sink with a silent promise to himself that he’d never drink around Ryan again.

Gavin had woken up with Ryan’s arm thrown around his waist, and so Gavin assumed that the discussion was behind them. But if he was correctly guessing what Ryan was apologizing for, he had thought wrong.

“You don’t need to apologize, Ryan. I was… I was being odd, I was talking nonsense, don’t worry, I was blathering, didn’t mean anything.” Gavin cut himself off before he put his foot in his mouth again.

“No.” Ryan shook his head, took a step towards the bed. Gavin caught a glimpse of something behind Ryan’s back, something shiny. He leaned forwards a little, trying to see what his boyfriend was hiding, but Ryan started talking again and Gavin reluctantly refocused. “You were trying to tell me something that was important to you, and I didn’t give you the right response.”

“There’s not a- Ryan, you don’t-“ Gavin scrambled for the right words, not sure what to do with such a serious discussion. Ryan always wanted to sit down and talk about things, but Gavin liked for things to just _happen_ and you dealt with it later. He could tell that this was something Ryan wanted to talk about, but Gavin just wasn’t sure that he had the words to talk about it.

“I was confused, at the time, and I didn’t want to say the wrong thing, so I didn’t say anything,” Ryan said.

Gavin felt the tension in his shoulders ease slightly. He had been so sure that Ryan hated him, that he’d been quiet because he was trying to push down his disgust. But if Ryan was telling the truth now, maybe he had just been nervous about getting the right response. Maybe he didn’t hate Gavin?

Ryan was talking again, and Gavin pulled himself from his thoughts to focus on Ryan’s words. “Listen, you know I love you.” Gavin nodded frantically, and Ryan stopped to smile for a second. Gavin smiled back automatically, loving the creases at the corners of Ryan’s eyes, loving how familiar that quiet smile was. “And you know that I love when you’re happy. So I don’t quite understand it, and you know I’ll want to talk about it, but at the end of the day if taking time off being an adult makes you feel better, I’m all for it, and I’m sorry I made you think any different.”

“I- Ryan…” Gavin twisted his fingers into each other, cursing himself for not being able to put words together.

“And to prove it, I bought you a present,” Ryan said, and finally brought out what he’d been hiding behind his back. 

“FISH!” Gavin shouted, and then laughed as Ryan threw it at his face. It hit his cheek and fell into his lap.

“I know we’ve got lots of stuffed things around the office, but I thought you might like one of your own, and this one is good to hug… I might have tested it out before I bought it.” Ryan’s hands, now unoccupied, were stuck in his pockets. Gavin could tell from the line of his shoulders that he was nervous.

Gavin picked up the large stuffed fish and hugged it to his chest. Ryan was right, it was big enough that it made him feel small and safe and it was an amazing soft texture. He’d expected the shiny scales to be rough, but it was perfect.

“I love it,” Gavin admitted, looking up at Ryan without loosing his hold on the fish.

“I love _you_ ,” Ryan said, visibly relaxing. “Do you want to give the fish a name?”

Gavin felt his eyes go wide and he held his fish a little closer, curling around it. That quiet glow was coming over his brain, making everything slower and softer. He fought it off, trying to straighten his shoulders.

“I can name him?” Gavin could hear his voice shift, higher and softer, and he winced, his fingers digging into the sides of the fish. But Ryan’s expression softened and he came closer to the bed, sliding his hands out of his pockets.

“It’s yours, Gav, of course you can name him. And he does need a name, doesn’t he?”

Gavin nodded. The fish did need a name, and Gavin would give it to him. He held the fish out at arm’s length, looking a little closer at the shiny scales that adorned his sides, the red scales along the back, the soft plush underbelly and the round black eyes on either side of a little sewn-on mouth.

“I think he looks like a Patrick,” Gavin declared.

“Patrick?” Ryan had gotten closer while Gavin was considering names, and when Gavin smiled up at him, Ryan brushed some of Gavin’s hair back from his face. Gavin leaned into the touch and Ryan chuckled, putting both hands into Gavin’s hair and combing through it. “Patrick is a great name, I’m sure he loves it.”

“Yeah? It’s a top name, I’d love to be called Patrick.”

“No you wouldn’t.”

“I would!” Gavin pulled his head away from Ryan’s lovely magic hands so that he could stare at him with all the certainty he could muster. “I would like to be called Patrick!”

“But then you wouldn’t be my little Gav, would you?” Ryan teased, and his hands were cupping Gavin’s cheeks, and Gavin melted into his grip. Ryan leaned forwards and pressed a kiss to Gavin’s forehead. “My little Gav,” he repeated into his hair, and Gavin clung to the fish like he was drowning and it was his lifeline.

“Ryan?” he managed, and he could hear how high and childish his voice had become, wavering with emotion.

“Yes, Gav?”

“Can we watch a movie together?”

“I’d love nothing more.” Gavin closed his eyes, hugged Patrick closer, nuzzled into Ryan’s hands, and thought that he had never, ever been happier.


End file.
